Tag Archives: parties

Jan17

New Years Eve 2014

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Wednesday, 31-Dec-13

New Years… it’s one of my favorite holidays, though I honestly can’t really tell you why.  I think it’s partially because it’s a time for new beginnings, and it has a “people should make out!” element added into the countdown.  Ohh, and popping champagne corks is always nice too.

So this year, Daniel hosted New Years… I think he held is last year too, but I’m not 100% sure.  Either way, it was EXCELLENT!

I dressed up, as usual, in my Kurta from Jig and Dave’s wedding… if anyone hasn’t seen a Kurta before, look it up quick – they’re amazing.  Very bright colored and lots of sequins… not the best with dreads, I’ll admit, but I survived and thrived non-the-less.  Mine was bright emerald, with perfect aquamarine fancy slippers, so I was definitely the belle of the ball for this one night.

The party night itself was a bit of a  blur – Terese and I took the train out, since the plan was to crash at Daniel’s place anyways, so there was no concern about cars or parking or any of that nonsense.  The train was completely packed, but that’s just the price you have to expect to pay on New Years Eve.  Nothing too bad, though I was a bit saddened by the lack of crazy people or interestingly dressed folks riding with us.

Instead, we got to the party, helped set up, and then proceeded to party down!  There wasn’t one overarching story to the party, so let me sum it up with a few fun points:

  • We had TONS of random and amazing drinks – Daniel and I both spent time playing bartender, though I have to say that I’m pretty sure that my Baileys and Frangelico coffee was basically the best thing ever.  I did make that, right?  Not a dream?  Hmm….
  • Brian (Daniel’s brother) and Mike LeVasseur were both able to make it out from Florida and California, respectively.  Thus, lots of time was spent catching up and hearing about various enterprises.  Damn, both of those guys are getting stuff done!
  • Terese pulled off a VERY nice outfit… I do enjoy events where people dress up.  It’s fun, and is a good excuse to play the fancy card.
  • The countdown was awesome, and lots of champagne was drank by all.  Daniel, I apologize for how messy your floor must have gotten.  My bad.
  • Some people are nice guys, and feel bad about crashing in bed with a girl who’s ex is in the same room with them.  Mike and I are not nice guys, so when the nice guy is drunk and just wants to sleep, we drag him to the room and toss him in the bed with the girl (they’re both clothed, don’t worry about it.  He’s a gentleman) and leave the annoyingly drunk ex to deal with it himself.  Laughs were had by all.  And high-fives.

The night ended well, basically with all of us crashing at random places throughout the house.  Terese and I found ourselves in the downstairs bedroom, on a sleeping pad that Daniel had laid out.  It wasn’t the most comfy thing ever, especially when on a hardwood floor instead of outside in the forest, but it was definitely acceptable, and we slept pretty well.  Very well, when you count everyone getting up constantly, people leaving at 5 in the morning, and the partiers outside.

 

Thursday, 01-Jan-14

The next morning started slowly and painfully… but honestly not nearly as painfully as I expected.  Chirag and I were the first ones away (technically Brian was, since he came downstairs, but that doesn’t count because he went back to sleep), followed quickly by Terese.  After I got up and put Terese back to bed, we got dressed and headed out for a constitutional… AKA a walk to Dunkin Donuts to get stuff for everyone.

Was a nice walk, doubly-so for seeing everyone taking the walk of shame, or being painfully hungover waiting for their coffee.  We got a box of coffee and a ton of donuts, said hi to a few police officers who were just too tired to deal with any of this shit, and headed back to start making breakfast.

Three Bostwicks later, everyone was awake and downstairs, eating bacon and sausage and eggs and other delicious concoctions.  The day went quickly from there, leading us on a few light adventures as we tried to shake the hangovers.  The Hobbit was watched, snacks were had, and the new year started out with a nicely comfortable sigh.

Nov22

A relaxing and in-the-city weekend… AKA “I moved 2000lbs of wood this weekend!”

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Weekend of 16-Nov & 17 Nov

 

Many weekends, I want to adventure and hike and climb and party.  But sometimes a week is slow and stressful, and I need a bit of a breather.  This is one of those weekends.  At least mostly.

Saturday, 16-Nov-13

  • Adventures in moving wood pellets!
    • Since we have a Pellet stove at my house in Cambridge, pellets needed to be acquired before the winter hit.  So i looked into it, and found that you can’t really buy single bags of pellets… anywhere, actually.  Instead, they sell by the ton.  Well… fuck it!  A ton is 50 bags, we’ll probably use that over the winter.  Right?  I hope so, because I ordered it up and set it to be delivered early on Saturday.
    • I was up and moving early, though… not so much before the delivery was set to be… BI didn’t hear anyone deliver anything, so I was a bit concerned that they’d just skipped over me.  I’d assumed that they would call…  But nope, I walk downstairs and the pallet of pellets is sitting and waiting for me
    • Bring Ringo outside to hang out with me while I re-stack them all indoors… it’s a long and heavy process, but it’s a pretty nice day out, so I’m actually happy starting the day this way
    • It’s a full ton… literally 50 bags weighing 40lbs each.  2000lbs.  And I moved them all in less than an hour.  With a short break in the middle to play with Ringo of course, but still.  <flexes>
  • After starting the morning with some lumberjackery (yes this counts!  Shut up!) I headed inside to relax and make up an excellent (and for once, not so simple) breakfast for myself. Ground Beef, cheese, and jam omlette, with bacon and tomatoes and apple slices on the side.  With, of course, some “Thunder Mountain” espresso.  Yum!
  • Spend the rest of the morning and early afternoon relaxing.  I was originally going to put the wrap on the windows to keep the heat in, but it was an unbelievably amazing day!  So instead of shuttering down the house, I opened up all the windows and let it breathe in the last breaths of autumn while Ringo and I went for a long walk
  • Yeah, some video games happened too
  • Around 3:00 Chirag shows up, and we hang out for a bit before rolling out to Jordan’s Furniture, where we get a late lunch and check out furniture and such.  Woo much fun.
  • First party of the night is Liz’s International potluck!
    • Just a fairly standard-issue dinner party, with the disclaimer that all potluck dishes should be international.  Chirag made Bean Salad, and I cooked up some Matzos Ball soup.  And as a note?  My soup got rather amazingly rave reviews.  Mmmhmm.  Grandma’s Recipe for the win, every time.
    • hang out and gnosh on tons of small bits, people are quite good cooks!
    • We play a few hands of Cards against Humanity… but to be honest, I don’t particularly enjoy the game.  So after a bit Chirag and I head out for the next party… 
  • Pack up the soup all careful-like into the car.
  • And now… Second party of the night!  Katies Disney Drinking night!
    • Daniel’s sister has a fair number of parties based around a very specific theme: drinking booze and watching Disney cartoons.
    • It’s a kind of simple premise, but it works very well: the rules being that if you’re not singing along to the songs, you have to be drinking along to the songs that people are singing.  Leads to lots of horridly off-key voices, and even more completely beverages when people don’t know all the words.
    • Enjoy ourselves,  have Gin & Tonics, and watch movies!  Beauty and the Beast, along with Tangled.  I hadn’t seen Tangled before, but it was actually quite good.
  • Drop off Chirag, then driving home carefully so as not to spill the soup!

Sunday, 17-Nov-13

  • No rush, up slowly.
  • Link up with Chirag, and grab brunch in Davis, at a place called Foundry.  AMAZING!
  • Another long walk with Ringo, since Lizzie isn’t home yet, she’s at a wedding with friends.  Maybe that’s why the weather is so perfect…
  • Head out to see Trans-Siberian Orchestra in Manchester!
    • Fun drive, without much difficulty
    • We park, and go out on a mission to Dunking Donuts.  However, due to Chirag’s “unique” method of reading a map, “one block up that way” turns into “a mile or so up the street in the wrong direction, so that we barely make it back to the arena in time”
    • The show itself!  Amazing and jaw-dropping! The music itself dealt with slightly low sound quality, most likely due to it being in an arena instead of somewhere with actual acoustics, but the show itself was amazing!  The lights and Pyrotechnics were top-notch, and the band members were obviously having a great time.
    • The stage itself was a prop too – different tiers, and sections would move around and swing out over the crowd, or raise up with neat lights underneath.
    • I definitely recognized most of the lights as things I’d worked on at Color Kinetics.  Kind of neat.
    • Damn though… symphonies are loud.  I think I got my hearing back two or three days later…
  • Drive home, no problems there.  Nice and simple actually
  • Nachos for dinner, then League with Das ‘Rag before bed.